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Any idea where Calvin Watkins got these? Some (Cooper, Secules) are obvious; others have SMU ties (Montgomery) .... but the guy at Toledo? The Evansville guy?

Interesting. Or just weird....

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Carlton Cooper, senior associate athletic director at SMU
Has overseen internal side for two years and has strong Texas ties

Scott Secules, senior associate athletic director at SMU
Was a finalist for Elon and Appalachian State openings

Michael O'Brien, athletic director at Toledo
A finalist for the TCU job who is interested in the D-FW area

John Montgomery, executive director of North Carolina's fund-raising arm
Was an associate athletic director at SMU from 1996 to 2001

Butch Worley, senior associate athletic director at Texas Involved in football and baseball, both of which have a recent national title

Bill McGillis, athletic director at Evansville
Is a finalist for the Long Beach State position

Rick Hart, associate athletic director at Oklahoma
His grandfather worked with Jim Copeland at Missouri

Steve Wilensky, investment manager
Worked as a fund-raiser at SMU from 1987 to 1997

How about a clean break from the Copeland years and hire someone with no ties to SMU --> fresh start

Also, what does this all mean for PB, will he have a shorter leash? Will the AD want to hire a new head coach, one of "his guys"?

[quote="chicago stang"]How about a clean break from the Copeland years and hire someone with no ties to SMU --> fresh start

Also, what does this all mean for PB, will he have a shorter leash? Will the AD want to hire a new head coach, one of "his guys"?[/quote] Copeland gave PB a contract extension right before his announcement to retire. Good for SMU ? Time will tell but certainly a case of one friend looking after another. This makes the leash longer but if we make a clean break, as you suggest, PB will be more accountable in the future for recruiting and record. I agree that despite Copelands accomplishments of a new Stadium etc. it is time for us to make a break as we have got to hire a staff with a solid MARKETING PLAN to GET MORE FAN SUPPORT. We have got to explore all options and not be complacent by hiring one of Copelands former are present staff. I personnaly liked Stallion's recommendation of a Brad Thomas type. A Russ Potts/ Brad Thomas marketer is Mandatory. The plans we have had like " If we build a new 53 million dollar stadium complex on campus the fans and recruiting will improve" have not panned out. Hopefully, President Turner will see the light but unfortunately most of the candidates the DMN article reported today were present or past associates of Copelands Staff. 7,000 at Sam Houston State football game will not work much longer. CHANGE IS NEEDED

westexSMU wrote: .... The plans we have had like " If we build a new 53 million dollar stadium complex on campus the fans and recruiting will improve" have not panned out....

Not to the extent we would have liked, but to suggest that recruiting is not better than it was when we were playing at the Cotton Bowl is simply inaccurate.

chicago stang wrote:How about a clean break from the Copeland years and hire someone with no ties to SMU --> fresh start

Hell, when Copeland came here he had no ties to SMU...what did that get us. We need IMHO someone who eats sleeps and breaths Red and Blue. Getting our "revenue sports" back on top needs to be more than a damn job...it needs to be a passion. We need somebody who cares beyond the paycheck about what is happening here. Obviously that person has to be able to do what AD's do, but with a real passion for SMU.

thrive[quote="Buddha"][quote="westexSMU"] .... The plans we have had like " If we build a new 53 million dollar stadium complex on campus the fans and recruiting will improve" have not panned out.... [/quote]Not to the extent we would have liked, but to suggest that recruiting is not better than it was when we were playing at the Cotton Bowl is simply inaccurate.[/quote] I like our new stadium. That is a non issue with me except to say our fan support has not really improved because we have not been successful in reaching out to Dallas. SMU was once Dallas's college football team. It will take a very talented Marketer to reunite Dallas with SMU, but I believe it can be done and so do alot of others on this board. As for our recruiting, we have all seen the video and it appears we some good athletes coming in but the facts remain no matter how much spin is put on it our recruiting class this year is not highly ranked and certainly we should thrive for better ranked class. Again, if we had better fan support it would help. I'm sure Coach would agree on that one.

[quote="PK"][quote="chicago stang"]How about a clean break from the Copeland years and hire someone with no ties to SMU --> fresh start[/quote]Hell, when Copeland came here he had no ties to SMU...what did that get us. We need IMHO someone who eats sleeps and breaths Red and Blue. Getting our "revenue sports" back on top needs to be more than a damn job...it needs to be a passion. We need somebody who cares beyond the paycheck about what is happening here. Obviously that person has to be able to do what AD's do, but with a real passion for SMU.[/quote] I agree PK about the "passion" and someone " who eats sleeps and breaths Red and Blue" would be great but we still need a Marketing Genius to pull it off. Got any recommendations ??? It will take someone also who is capable of reaching out to Dallas. We have our people who love this program but make no mistake, we cannot do it alone and therefore we must create "passion" about SMU Sports within the city of Dallas again. We can if we get this right.

westexSMU wrote:I agree PK about the "passion" and someone " who eats sleeps and breaths Red and Blue" would be great but we still need a Marketing Genius to pull it off. Got any recommendations ???

Not yet, but I'm working on it.

We've got a damn good marketer in Shaun Heilbron. Give him the same budget and resources available in other athletic department, and the entire Dallas area would be saturated in Red and Blue.

DALLASDIEHARD, good endorsment about Shaun Heilbron submit his name to the soon to be formed AD search commitee.

I do hope Shaun (spelling?) gets a good position

Maybe it is just me but the fact that we can't even get students to walk 100 yards to attend football games and there is really never any major attempts to boost attendance does not leas me to believe that we are doing a bang up job of advertising and marketing.

Totally agree with you

[quote="BrianTinBigD"]Maybe it is just me but the fact that we can't even get students to walk 100 yards to attend football games and there is really never any major attempts to boost attendance does not leas me to believe that we are doing a bang up job of advertising and marketing.[/quote] YOU BRING UP ANOTHER GOOD POINT, we also need to reach out better to our own campus along with the Dallas Area. Do you think there is a chance President Turner will get this ? If changes in marketing are not made and we keep plodding along with our football attendence....what do you think will happen to our program ?

We need IMHO someone who eats sleeps and breaths Red and Blue.

This couldn't be further from the truth, we need someone who has been at another sucessful program, someone who knows what is required to build a succesful program. In my opinion, anyone who has been at SMU will not be very experienced in with this.